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Romney Blasts Obama on Intel Leaks

Mitt Romney’s foreign policy speech to the VFW today hit the right marks, but was unfortunately sparse on details and lacked an overarching vision. It was definitely more of a political speech than an ideological one; he mentioned President Obama by name 14 times, and many of his positions were framed in terms of his opposition to Obama.

But Romney’s speech did get an assist from Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein. He quoted her while criticizing the administration’s intelligence leak investigation:

Lives of American servicemen and women are at stake. But astonishingly, the administration failed to change its ways. More top-secret operations were leaked, even some involving covert action in Iran.

This isn’t a partisan issue; it’s a national security crisis. And yesterday, Democrat Senator Dianne Feinstein, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said, quote, “I think the White House has to understand that some of this is coming from their ranks.”

This conduct is contemptible. It betrays our national interest. It compromises our men and women in the field. And it demands a full and prompt investigation by a special counsel, with explanation and consequence. Obama appointees, who are accountable to President Obama’s attorney general, should not be responsible for investigating the leaks coming from the Obama White House.

Whoever provided classified information to the media, seeking political advantage for the administration, must be exposed, dismissed, and punished. The time for stonewalling is over.

Obama has had decent poll numbers on his national security performance, though that’s mainly because he’s flouted the left’s policy prescriptions and increased the use of drones and other covert operations. The Obama campaign has been trashing Romney’s foreign policy “platitudes” — yes, really — in an effort to show how much more serious Obama supposedly is on these issues.

But Feinstein really undermined that with her acknowledgment yesterday that the intelligence leaks probably came from the White House. This is the last story the Obama campaign wants to be discussing on a day when it’s trying to play up its national security achievements before Romney’s Israel trip. Apparently somebody passed that message along to Feinstein, who backpedaled on her assertion this afternoon:

“I stated that I did not believe the president leaked classified information,” Feinstein said in the statement on Tuesday. “I shouldn’t have speculated beyond that, because the fact of the matter is I don’t know the source of the leaks.”

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney seized on Feinstein’s remarks in a speech at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention Tuesday, accusing President Obama of not trying to find the source of the leaks until after the election.

Feinstein said that she regretted her comments were being used against Obama and said she was “disappointed” in Romney’s remarks.

It’s too bad Feinstein felt the need to backtrack, especially on something that’s so obvious. If some of the leaks were from the Presidential Daily Brief, this means there are a limited number of sources. The fact that the stories ended up benefiting the Obama White House politically gives you a good idea of the type of people who might have had a motive.